


Night Call

by Leyenn



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Episode Related, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-16
Updated: 2009-11-16
Packaged: 2017-10-03 02:07:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leyenn/pseuds/Leyenn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Janet gets a late night phone call.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Night Call

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place during _Nightwalkers_, with spoilers for previous episodes up to that.

I've always thought there was something surreal about Cheyenne Mountain late at night. In the dark when the parking lot is all but deserted and the rest of the world is silent, I can stand in the middle of this great wide empty space with the mountain looming beyond the streetlights, and it just seems to go upwards and onwards forever. Unworldly, Sam would say, and of anyone she would know. She stands on more worlds in a week than I ever knew existed in my entire life... and it gets her into more trouble than I ever dreamed of seeing, vicariously or otherwise. Talk about surreal. This time I was out of the bedroom for all of five minutes, and a glass of water later she's in the shower ready to drive halfway across the country on the strength of a two a.m. phone call? I know they can take care of themselves, Teal'c especially, but still some part of me imagines it should just have been O'Neill going with her, or Daniel...

I shake myself and shove my hands into the pockets of my lab coat, pulling it around me to fight off the cool air. I've spent most of the last five years waiting here for them, and it's rare that I resent it - my being here when they come home is the nature of what I do, and I'm proud of that. But tonight is different, different because Daniel is gone and Jack is gone and Sam isn't even offworld - she's out playing Scully in some small town mystery story, and it all just feels _wrong_ to me right now. Damn it, why do I have to need her so much at the most impossible times?

I'm only a few steps from the sidewalk when my cell buzzes against my thigh, and I almost jump in surprise at the sound. I really don't want to answer, because now it feels cold and lonely and I just want to be back inside - don't recognise the number, but that's hardly surprising. Some friend of Cassie's with the wrong speed dial, most likely, just happening to catch me in the half hour tonight when I'm not buried under twenty floors of solid steel and concrete. I answer it without any attempt to keep the exhaustion out of my voice in the hope that whoever it is will get the point and let me hang up. "Janet Fraiser."

"_*Hey, sweetie.*_" The voice on the other end is totally unexpected, and just about the best I could ever have imagined hearing. "_*You okay? You sound tired.*_"

"Sam?" I spin round in surprise, too late to remind myself that she's on the end of the phone, not right behind me however close she sounds. Damn it, I wish she were. "Why are you calling my cell?"

"_*Well, Cass said you still weren't home, so...*_" She smiles into the words, and I can just picture her stretched out on some small town motel bed with a crappy plastic phone in one hand, dialling my number from memory without any fear of waking me since she knows I'm never in bed before one a.m. It's always the simple little things I miss. I hear a soft note of concern in her voice, feel a catch in my throat at the sound. "_*You're not still at the base, are you?*_"

A fast look around, catching the eye of one of the wandering guards, and I quickly nod back and turn away. "In the parking lot," I admit. "Just getting some fresh air." I could get away with a lie, but I know she won't really be upset that I'm imitating her so well.

"_*You don't miss me already?*_" She's teasing, so why are there tears in my eyes so suddenly?

"Desperately," I whisper back. It's nearly painful to need her this much. "I want you home with me so badly, Sam."

"_*Hey.*_" I can hear the alarm in her voice, imagine her sitting up and cradling the phone in her lap as if she could hold me close, the way she always does when I'm feeling down. "_*Something's up? What is it?*_" An edge of panic creeps into her voice when I can't find an answer. "_*Janet?*_"

"Nothing." She doesn't believe me, I know - I can hear her already thinking out the quickest route back in her head, but I don't know how to even begin to explain. "Really, I'm just..." I can't even put it into words. "Just feeling the dark, I guess. It's a little chilly and I didn't bring my car keys out."

Her voice tightens with worry. "_*You want me to hang up and call your office?*_" She catches my hesitation and surges on even though she knows we can't talk like this over a base phone. "_*If-*_"

"No." One of the guards glances my way - I must have raised my voice. "Please, Sam. I'm fine." Or I would be if you were here. "It's so good to hear your voice," I murmur as I turn my head away and wander over towards the car lot again. "I wasn't expecting you to call this late. Shouldn't you be asleep?"

"_*Nah, I sent the guys out on the town. I'd better wait for them to get back, just in case.*_" I can hear her chuckle and her voice is soft for a moment. "_*You know I never believed the Colonel about Teal'c and that 'magic fingers' bed but I swear on my life, it's actually true.*_"

The Colonel. Whether it's lack of sleep or the darkness or just hearing Sam's voice I have no idea, but the feelings I've been trying to hold back for weeks now just refuse to stay under control any longer. Good Lord, it's just insane that I have it in me to get so emotional about hearing his name - never mind that it's Jack O'Neill of all people - but somehow it just reinforces how suddenly, intensely lonely it is in the cold and dark without any of them here. "I miss him, Sam." Damn it, please don't let her hear me starting to cry. "I miss both of them."

"_*I know.*_" Silence reigns for a deep, still moment while it all fits together in that brilliant mind of hers, and then she sucks in her breath and there's a rustling sound - as if she's dropped back onto the bed when it hits her. "_*Oh, man, and now I'm out here, and you're still waiting for all of us to come home.*_"

Oh, she knows me so well. I cover my mouth with my free hand to bite back a sob, and the tears slide down between my fingers. "_*I should have asked to have you come with us,*_" her voice shakes and she sounds absolutely stricken that she didn't put it together before now. "_*I didn't think - God, I'm so sorry.*_"

"It's not your fault, Sam." The words edge out behind my hand, and my voice sounds far too raw for her not to hear the tears. Crap. "I'm okay - really - it's only that this is the first time you've gone anywhere since..." oh Lord, I can't say it, I can't even say it...

"_*Since we took him away,*_" she finishes gently, and then all I can do is nod in silence as the tears roll silently down my face. I want to just let it all come out right now, right here - how much it's been slowly tearing me apart that I couldn't do my job well enough to save him, that it had to fall on Sam to plead with him not to let us lose someone else who means so much, that he's going through God knows what right now because all I could do was stand there helpless and watch the same way I had to with Daniel-

"_*Janet. Janet, baby, please listen to me.*_" Her voice sounds so close and I know she's hundreds of miles away, and it hurts like a great gaping crack in my chest as I cradle the phone to my ear and bite my palm to keep from crying. "_*It hurts, I know it does and if I could be there right now, if I could just be with you...*_" She sounds on the edge of tears herself. "_*You know I would, whatever it took, if I could. It doesn't matter what's going on here, it doesn't matter. None of it means anything without you. I love you.*_" She promises it in that quiet, hoarse voice that says she would do anything in the world to take me in her arms and help me believe it could all be okay. "_*I was missing you before I even stepped on the plane, and right now... God, I thought this would make it easier.*_" She says it as if she's trying to apologise, and I can't bear that.

"Nothing is going to make it any easier, Sam," is all I can say, because it's the honest truth. It just hurts too much. "But I'm so glad that you called. Really."

"_*I love you,*_" she whispers back into my ear. "_*More than anything else in the world, Janet. I swear.*_" I can hear a sudden and soft laugh. "_*I think I would honestly kill to be able to hold you right now.*_"

A smile makes its way through the tears drying on my face, and I wipe carefully under each eye with my fingertips. "Well, maybe you don't have to go that far."

"_*Sure?*_"

I let a watery laugh answer her tease. "Yes. Not quite that far." Something in me pretends to think about it - anything to lighten the moment. "Although if you wanted to hijack an Asgard mothership and get over here for tonight, I think I could go along with that."

Laughter answers me again, growing easier and more amused by the word. "_*If I thought Freyr was in the area I might just give it a try.*_"

"I know you would." And it's true: my sweet, passionate Sam is just crazy enough to pull a stunt like that. The awful thing to admit is that at this minute, feeling the way I do, I'd only cheer her on. "But maybe we should hold off on that until you've been gone a little longer than two days, hmm?"

"_*I want to be with you, Janet.*_" The heartfelt honesty in those words makes my heart race, and I can feel a rush of heat flare up my spine since one of the guards picks that exact moment to sweep his torchlight over where I'm standing. Thank God the base CMO standing around in the parking lot and chatting on her cell at nearly midnight is apparently not alarming enough to earn more than a passing glance, or we could have been in for a world of trouble.

"_*So, what are you wearing?*_"

My head jerks up at her voice in my ear again, and it takes me a long second to realise that Sam really did just ask that incredibly unoriginal question. "Uh." I can actually hear myself swallow in the sudden quiet. "My uniform. Lab coat. I was working late on that sample you sent me." I try to resist asking, but I can't, especially when I know she's only trying to cheer me up and going about it so well. "What about you?"

"_*Nothing special.*_" She's lying, of course. I know everything she owns and it all looks special on her. "_*White shirt, tags and those black leather jeans you like.*_" She makes a soft wincing sound. "_*The boots were making my feet ache, though.*_"

I smile at that. My only physical advantage in this relationship, that Sam can't even cope with wearing high heels for more than a day at a time. Not that anyone as tall and beautiful as she is should need to but I admit it does strike a little crazy spark of amusement in me. Now even her simple description lets me pick out the clothes in my mind's eye, and I know her body well enough to know exactly how gorgeous she must look stretched out on that bed. "You're always special, Sam," I assure her with a little more sap in my voice than I expected. That's what happens when I've been crying, I guess, and I can feel from the quiet on her end that she's smiling at me for it.

"_*Maybe.*_" She's either teasing or blushing, because she knows I believe when I tell her things like that.

"Always," I repeat tenderly, because it bears repeating. A dozen times or more if necessary. "Especially to me."

"_*The Asgard still owe me,*_" she says absently, obviously knowing she'll make me laugh. It works, but not well enough for what she's trying.

"Don't brush me off that way, Samantha Carter," I shoot back. "I am in love with the most amazing, most beautiful and very likely most intelligent woman on Earth, and sooner or later you have to accept that." And if saying that with the Mountain looming over me isn't the closest I've ever come to confessing my sins then I'm probably going straight to hell, and damned if I care. "And before you even think about pretending you don't have a chance against all that-"

"_*Wouldn't even dream of it.*_" You're smirking, Sam, I can hear it.

"Well... good." Then, because I can't think of anything else to say, I fill in the silence with the only thing that's really been on my mind since she left. "I need you right now, Sam. It just... it hurts not having you here."

"_*I know.*_" Sometimes that's all she needs to say. "_*We'll be back as soon as we figure out whatever's going on here, I promise.*_"

Something jars inside me when I remember exactly why she's out there - the world doesn't stop just because I miss my lover, and neither will whoever killed this mysterious Doctor Fleming. "I know you will. I'm sorry."

"_*Don't. Don't even say that.*_" She almost growls it into the phone, so fiercely I can hear the crackle of her breathing over the line. "_*There's only one place I want to be tonight and I promise, it has nothing to do with Teal'c and this... weird vibrating bed fixation.*_" Whatever else I'm trying not to feel right now, just picturing the look on her face makes me smile. "_*Let's talk about something else, huh?*_"

A good idea or we could be on the verge of a mutual long-distance breakdown here, so I gratefully pick the first thing that comes to mind. "Cass is turning seventeen in a few weeks."

I haven't even stopped speaking before she answers that. "_*I'll be there. I promise.*_" She's making an effort to sound more relaxed; I can hear her moving around on the bed. "_*You wanna take her out somewhere, maybe go away for the weekend?*_"

The idea is immediately appealing, I have to admit. Just to get away from all this, try out being normal people for a few days, but really... "Sam, you honestly think you can convince a seventeen year old to spend her birthday away from her friends with _two_ mothers in tow?"

"_*It depends on the ratio of time away to money spent, if I remember correctly,*_" she laughs back. Well, yes - but remembering my own strikingly efficient spending abilities at that age, I was trying not to look at it like that. "_*I just thought, we've never really had the chance to take her anywhere outside Colorado. Maybe we could fly up to New York, or go visit Mark in San Diego for a few days.*_" For some reason that stuns me into silence and that endearing insecurity of hers leaps in to fill it. "_*Hey, look, if it's a bad idea-*_"

"No. No, I..." I just wasn't expecting an offer to meet the family, that's all. Whoa. "It's a lovely idea, Sam. Thank you."

"_*Hey, that's what you keep me around for. Make sure you tell her I called, okay? Tell her...*_" She hesitates and then sighs softly, the way she mutters in her sleep sometimes, as if she can't quite get the words right. "_*Just tell her that I love you both and I'll be home soon.*_" She says it in that quiet, achingly tender voice that only I ever get to hear and I can quite truthfully say is the most beautiful sound on earth. _Oh, Sam._

"_*Damn it, I made you cry, didn't I?*_" She knows, and she knows better than to think I'll admit that - it's not even really a question. "_*Are you sure you're okay? I should really go, it's not helping that you're probably freezing to death out there.*_"

Freezing... oh. It is kind of chilly again. "I hadn't noticed."

A gentle laugh in my ear says what she thinks of that. "_*They actually pay you for those fantastic observational skills?*_"

"Not nearly enough," I joke. She's right, though, as much as I want to deny it. It's damn cold once you start to notice and I'm almost certain I'm going to incur a severe questioning from some cautious young airman if I stay out here much longer. "I love you, Sam. You remember that."

"_*Just you try making me forget.*_" Now *that's* an offer if ever I heard one, and I can give as good as I get in that department. I drop my voice to a husky whisper and smile into the phone.

"Call me tomorrow night and I'll take you up on that."

I swear, I heard her shiver. I swear it. "_*Evil woman,*_" she growls against my ear. "_*God, you drive me crazy.*_"

Can't help but grin at a compliment like that. "That's my job."

"_*And you're the best at it.*_" She sighs and I catch the distant 'click' of her phone going back onto a table. "_*Listen, the guys'll be back anytime now. I'll call you tomorrow, okay?*_"

"Okay." What's that old line about tomorrow just not coming soon enough? "Talk to you then."

"_*Yeah. Love you.*_"

That's always the last thing she says whenever we talk, but after a long second of waiting I can still hear her waiting to for me to hang up first. Always the little things. "Love you too, Sam," and it's suddenly not so cold as I hold the phone out and aim one thumb at the eerily green 'end call' sign. "See you soon."

"_*Oh God - wait! Janet!*_" Sam's voice screeches suddenly out into the silence and I yank the phone back to my ear, feel my heart thump at her sudden yell. "_*Janet!*_"

"I'm still here, honey." Please, please don't let something be wrong, not now. "Are you okay?!"

"_*What?*_" She sounds confused that I even asked. "_*No, I'm fine. I just forgot to ask you a question.*_"

I smile and shake my head, slowly letting myself relax. She's fine, she's okay - just a question, although for the life of me I don't recall what could be important enough to panic her that badly. "Anything, honey. What is it?"

There's an embarrassed pause, and then I can't stop myself from a burst of laughter at the words that come next.

"_*What was in that syringe?*_"

  


*

  



End file.
